


supermassive black hole

by epiproctan



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Accidental Voyeurism, Anal Fingering, Anal Sex, Blow Jobs, Casual Sex, Dry Humping, Fluff, Fluff and Smut, Friends With Benefits, Love Confessions, M/M, Masturbation, Misunderstandings, Mutual Pining, Pining, Pining Keith (Voltron), Smut, Tooth-Rotting Fluff
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-11-08
Updated: 2016-11-08
Packaged: 2018-08-29 21:01:47
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,223
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8505238
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/epiproctan/pseuds/epiproctan
Summary: Keith has always known that he wasn’t going to get what he truly wants out of the arrangement, but he also hadn’t ever imagined that it would just…end.
 aka that classic fic where lance wants to stop hooking up but keith wants something else entirely





	

**Author's Note:**

  * Translation into Русский available: [сверхмассивная черная дыра](https://archiveofourown.org/works/13845324) by [DreamerX2](https://archiveofourown.org/users/DreamerX2/pseuds/DreamerX2)



> beep beep super cliche plotline coming through

Keith’ll give him this: Lance sucks dick like a champ.

It’s that goddamn thing he does with his tongue that has Keith curling in over him, the way he doesn’t even seem to care when Keith just about fucks into his throat that makes Keith’s knees weak. Keith had started off leaning back against the wall and casually carding his fingers through Lance’s hair, but now he’s holding on for dear life because he’s worried his legs will buckle out from under him if he lets go. Lance has him down to a science, really.

Especially when he takes a moment to lift his eyes, to look up at Keith. He’s got drool leaking from the corner of his lips and his mouth stuffed full of dick but he still manages to raise an eyebrow at Keith and it’s—dammit—it’s _unbelievably_ attractive. Because his eyes are just that endless blue and his eyelashes are thick and dark and something about his expression is cocky and pisses Keith off in the most endearing way possible. Not to mention, you know, how Keith is about three seconds away from coming down his throat.

When he does so it’s with a groan and Lance swallows it down unblinkingly, and then pulls off and wipes his mouth with the back of his hand. There’s a smirk there when his arm drops. It’s not like he doesn’t know he’s done a good job. Or rather, his unwavering confidence in himself is telling him that he did at least, and this time it’s actually right. Either way, it’s a long moment before Keith comes down off the dizzying high of release enough to realize that he’s staring, and that it’s time to look away.

“Pretty great, huh?” Lance asks, climbing to his feet.

Keith shrugs like it was nothing special. Like these moments with Lance aren’t what he looks forward to when he wakes up in the morning. He grabs Lance by the hips and shoves him back against the wall, switching their positions.

Knowing Lance will be loud he glances up and down the hallway before sinking to his knees. There’s not much of a chance that any of the other five on this ship will happen to wander down this dead-end hallway in the bowels of a castle built for many times its current number of occupants, but the idea of it makes Keith tense unpleasantly. No one else knows what they get up to here and honestly no one should.

Why should they tell everyone else about some casual hookups in their free time? Why would anyone even want to know about what the two of them do to destress? It’s just sex, because there’s no one better to do it with out here in the emptiness of space.

This is what Keith thinks about as Lance sinks his fingers into his hair, scrapes his nails gently against his scalp. With just the head of his dick barely in his mouth it’s too early to be sounding so needy, but the purr-like, “Mmm,” rumbles in his throat anyway. Keith closes his eyes and basks in the feeling of Lance’s hand combing through his hair, the shape of him between his lips, and reminds himself.

It’s just sex.

* * *

 

How many months ago did this start? Five? Six? Keith isn’t sure. But he is sure that he remembers what it felt like that first time, shamelessly grinding against Lance fully-clothed like some high schooler with his first girlfriend. They hadn’t even kissed until they were about to come, and when Lance bit down on Keith’s bottom lip Keith had spilled in his pants, just like that. The only reason he retained his dignity was that Lance wasn’t far behind, huffing against Keith’s cheek, after which he immediately pushed away grumbling about needing to do laundry now.

That had simply been the unfortunate result of a number of factors aligning, like bickering that got a little too physical, too much pent-up energy after a hard fight, and a few months of being trapped in space with only their hands for relief. (Not that this was any different from what Keith was used to, admittedly, as it wasn’t like he ever had visitors to his desert shack, let alone ones who would help him out with sexual frustrations.) But the bottom line is that from the onset this whole thing, functionally, was an accident.

It was still an accident the second time when Lance marched up to him after a fight, tore his helmet off, backed him against a wall, and reached into his pants without any preamble. It was an accident the third time when Keith showed up in Lance’s doorway right when he was about to hop into the shower and they blew each other under the water. It was an accident the fourth time in Keith’s bedroom, and the fifth time at 4 am on the couch in the common room, and the eleventh time in Blue.

It’s an accident this time too, with Keith watching Lance’s face, waiting for the way his mouth falls open and his eyes scrunch up when he’s feeling really, _really_ good. If Keith sees that he’ll probably come on the spot, all across Lance’s stomach. If he’s lucky Lance won’t complain _too_ much about it, and if he’s _really_ lucky Lance will feel Keith tightening around him and come then too, inside of him.

He’s aware that this is an accident though, especially because it’s pretty obvious that they just _fell_ here. Lance couldn’t be bothered to sit any further on his bed than at its edge, Keith straddling his lap. Though admittedly this is Keith’s favorite position. Here he can ride Lance but also see him, and sometimes Lance holds him by the hips so hard it’s like he really does want him there, like he’s scared he’ll float away. But this tumble of limbs here is nothing premeditated, except in Keith’s traitorous dreams.

He tends to get what he wants sooner or later, at least in the restricted contexts of these situations. Lance makes his face, says Keith’s name even, and that’s it for him. When he comes down from the whole thing he’s leaning his head against Lance’s chest. With decisive movements he stands, swats Lance’s hand away when he goes to help wipe the liquid that trickles down the inside of his leg, and puts his clothes on.

“Hey, Keith,” Lance says, as Keith is almost at the door.

Keith half-turns. Doesn’t look at him, because he shouldn’t even want to. “What?”

Lance pauses.

“Yeah, never mind,” he says.

* * *

 

Lance has Keith’s chest pushed right up against the glass of the observation deck, leaking head of his cock leaving streaks on its surface. All Keith can see is stars and planets, and it’s beautiful, but he’s a little more focused on the sounds of Lance panting against the back of his neck, the obscene things he’s doing with his fingers inside of him.

In the distance, a nebula catches Keith’s eye, its swirling shape outlined against the vast infinity. He scrabbles against the glass for some kind of purchase when Lance adds a third finger unannounced, and shuts his eyes to the view, eventually settling for pushing his palms flat against the window. The stretch is so good and Lance knows just where to hit him so that he feels it spiking through his body.

Keith eases open his eyes again, seeking the nebula, but instead focuses on the glass instead of what’s beyond it. He makes the mistake of catching Lance’s gaze in the reflection there, hungry, with eyebrows scrunched low in concentration, searching Keith’s face. Their gazes lock, Lance drives in hard, and just like that Keith spills out against the glass, cock untouched. He leans his forehead against the cool surface, breathing fast, riding it out.

“That’s not fair. I didn’t even get to fuck you yet,” Lance grumbles, taking his fingers out.

“Do it now,” Keith says against the glass, voice hoarse. He doesn’t care that he’s oversensitive and tight now. He doesn’t care, as long as it’s Lance.

“Are you sure?” Lance asks, his palms rubbing warmth against Keith’s hipbones.

“ _Do it_ ,” Keith says.

When Lance pushes in, Keith has to bite his lip to keep from crying out. It’s worth it, to feel Lance pressed up against his back like this, to listen to the sound of his voice as the stars fly by.

* * *

 

“I can’t do this anymore,” says Lance.

He’s suddenly sitting up, and Keith is coming with him because he’d been resting his head in the middle of Lance’s chest, almost managing to doze off. But nope, not anymore, because he’s been pushed off. Keith sits up ramrod straight, feeling more like he’s fallen out of the airlock than the inches from the top of Lance’s supine body to the mattress.

 _“What?_ ” he snaps. It’d been a pretty satisfying fuck and now Keith was getting a few precious moments of quiet, cuddly Lance rubbing slow circles on his back, which didn’t happen nearly often enough. Of course Lance had to go and _ruin it_.

He’s standing now, tugging on his pants, tugging off his pants when he realizes he forgot to put on his boxers first, hopping about trying to gather his socks.

“I can’t do this anymore,” he babbles all the while. “It’s been fun but…actually, you know, that’s not true. It hasn’t been fun. So I’m gonna stop now, before it turns into a bigger mess than it already is.”

Keith scrambles to his feet. He doesn’t know what to do once he gets there. He can’t physically stop Lance from leaving the room. “A mess? That’s what this is? _A mess_?”

“Yeah, it is,” Lance says. He hasn’t looked at Keith once the entire time, and now he’s shrugging on his jacket. “It’s a mess and I don’t want to deal with it anymore. Let’s just go back to how things were before. No sex, no problems. Okay?”

“What the hell?” is all Keith can muster for a second. “No, _this_ is a problem—”

“Not for me, not anymore,” Lance says, making for the door.

He hesitates when he reaches it, and turns to look Keith in the eye for the first time since he launched himself from the bed.

“Keith, I—,” he starts, and then stops.

“ _What_ , Lance?” Keith spits, bewildered.

Lance turns back towards the door and opens it. “I hate your dumb mullet.”

He feels like if the door could slam behind Lance, it would, but since it’s a sliding door powered by Altean technology it just buzzes quietly back into place. Keith stands there in the middle of the room, his arm half-extended and his fingers reaching, and feels the sting spread through his body.

 _He was joking_ , thinks Keith. _He was overreacting to something dumb going on in his head. He’ll come back._

He doesn’t come back.

* * *

 

Keith has always known that he wasn’t going to get what he truly wants out of the arrangement, but he also hadn’t ever imagined that it would just…end.

Maybe one day. Keith’s not exactly a planner, an imaginer of the future, but even he’s had those moments where he’s thought about the day the war is over and everyone is deposited back on the surface of Earth. He’s always known that Lance would probably disappear back to his family, overjoyed, and never once glance over his shoulder at Keith. The possibility is hard to confront sometimes but Keith can recognize that it always could’ve come to a crashing halt even sooner than that, like when he wakes up thrashing from his nightmares of coming across a broken Lance on the battlefield.

But he’s never considered the idea that they would stop suddenly. Of their own volition.

The worst part of it all is that Lance is still _Lance_. He’s there cracking dumb jokes in the kitchen before breakfast, he’s tripping up at the worst possible times during training, he’s singing loud and off-key in the halls, he’s winking at alien girls, he’s got one arm slung around Hunk’s shoulder and the other ruffling Pidge’s hair. He’s got a jab for every time Keith walks into the room and a smirk for every tick Keith spends annoyed about it.

In response, Keith really can’t do anything but continue to be Keith. It’s not like he was ever anything _other_ than Keith after all, the one who bites at Lance’s bait and has irritation in spades. He could be angry, sad, upset, disappointed, and maybe he _is_ those things, but he can’t throw those emotions around like he really wants to. To the others, who have no idea what happened between them, it would seem like an unprovoked attack.

To himself too, it would seem like an unprovoked attack. So what if Lance doesn’t want to sleep with him anymore? It’s not Keith’s decision. It’s not as though they ever had anything binding anyway. Casual sex is all it was, is all it ever would be. Lance never owed Keith anything, certainly not the promise of a next time.

So it’s life as usual aboard the Castle-ship. The bruises fade from Keith’s collarbone, and the weight of Lance’s fingers on his hips fades from his tactile memory. But the sharp burn that simmers just under Keith’s skin all the time, that’s here to stay.

It’s not easy to watch Lance. Sometimes he does it anyway. It’s like a punishment for feeling this way, a bizarre mental self-mutilation. Because Lance, for all his ridiculous antics and unbecoming remarks and complete failures in the field, is a sight to behold. It’s not easy to watch Lance and not want to touch. It’s not easy to watch Lance and not want to _have_.

Keith buries his head under his pillows at night like that can keep out the dreams. He shuts his eyes during team trainings because he doesn’t want to see. It’s unfair, he thinks. He never wanted this, any of it. He never wanted to feel like all the stars in the sky were finally his, but they could only scorch him for millisecond. He could never really bask in their warmth. He never wanted to want the stars in the first place, but here he was.

* * *

 

Keith left his jacket in the changing room again.

He does this, from time to time. He’s sweaty after drills and when he changes back from his armor into his casual clothes he forgets about it. It’s not a big deal, it’s just annoying to have to walk all the way down there and get it. Especially when he doesn’t even notice until it’s 1 am PST (Pidge Standard Time, the system they’ve set up on the ship to regulate “awake” and “sleeping” hours, as if that means anything at all to a bunch of recent students), and it’s cold in the castle.

When he goes to fetch it he’s not really expecting anyone to be awake, or at least both awake and in the changing room, so when he hears noises from inside he stops outside the door. He doesn’t recognize what he’s hearing at first, but it certainly sounds familiar, so he listens closer, and

Oh. _Oh._

There’s a reason it sounds familiar. It’s a sound he’s heard dozens of times. It’s a sound that haunts his dreams, for quiznak’s sake, echoes in his ears like a song stuck in his head. It’s a sound that he enjoys against all logic, and a sound that he thought he probably would never hear again. It’s a sound that, despite his best efforts, makes his stomach burn and his fingers twitch and his flesh prickle.

He doesn’t even think to stop himself. He just hits the button for the door, and it slides open silently.

Lance’s back is to him, sitting on the floor next to a column, leaning his head against it. He’s the source of the sounds, an occasional whimper, a moan. He’s never been very good at keeping quiet, in this context or any other, and his voice carries. His right arm is working, and Keith can’t see it because Lance is hunched over himself, facing away. But he can see it in his mind, the curl of his fingers over his shaft, the jolts of his hips.

And, in his free hand, he’s got Keith’s jacket pushed to his face.

Frozen solid, all Keith can do is stand there and watch.

Keith has never really felt rooted to the ground before, but he thinks now that if he tried to move his boots would turn out to be made of lead. Lance hasn’t noticed him come in, and he’s still sitting there, working himself, close to orgasm from the sounds of it. His voice is something beautiful, warm and raspy, and Keith feels himself hit by it with each wordless syllable, electric shocks down his spine. Lance is so Lance, so gorgeously, attractively Lance, in the way that his spine arches, his head tosses back.

And when he comes it’s Keith’s name that pours out of his mouth. Once, twice, three times.

Keith inhales, deep and unsteady, as Lance collapses against the column again.

“Lance?”

Lance jolts up straight, his shoulders up to his ears. He turns his head, slowly.

His cheeks are red, his ears are red, his neck is red. His mouth opens like a goldfish’s. And his eyes, wide and scared, shine watery and full and bloodshot. Has he been—has he been _crying?_

“Oh no,” says Lance, suddenly jerking into motion. He’s dropping Keith’s jacket, he’s zipping up his pants, he’s climbing to his feet. “Oh hell fucking no.”

“Wait, Lance—,” Keith says, but Lance has already pushed around him and is making a beeline for the door, legs straight and stiff as he powerwalks.

“Nope,” Lance says.

So Keith follows him out of the room. “Come on, Lance!”

Lance gives a fearful glance over his shoulder, his teeth clenched and his lips pulled down into a look of desperation. It strikes Keith as ironic that someone so shameless can be so embarrassed. He breaks into a jog when he sees Keith following him.

“Nope, nope, we are _not_ talking about this,” Lance says, and rounds a corner.

Keith runs after him. Lance doesn’t even look at him but hears his footfalls and speeds up, the bottom of his own jacket flapping behind him.

“What kind of creep even just stands there and watches something like that?” Lance asks to the hallway.

It’s Keith’s turn to be embarrassed. Lance isn’t wrong. He really should have just left quietly, or at least made his presence known as soon as he walked in. But instead he’s a creep. He’s the kind of creep who watches the guy he used to hook up with get off on smelling his jacket. That makes them both creeps, he guesses.

“Lance, just _stop_ ,” he finds himself shouting after him.

“Not happening,” Lance says, and turns another corner. They’re reaching the front of the ship, and Keith begins to wonder how long they’re going to do this for. Lance will get tired eventually. Quite frankly he just doesn’t have the stamina Keith does.

“ _Why_?” Keith asks. “Stop running, goddamn it!”

“No way!” Lance says back. Keith is surprised he’s still shouting. They’re both practically sprinting down the hallway now. Keith doesn’t know what he’s going to do when he catches Lance but it’s probably not going to be pretty. “Let’s both just leave and pretend that none of this ever happened, okay?”

“I don’t _want_ to pretend it never happened!” Keith yells.

Lance throws open the ballroom doors and bursts through, almost tumbling down the stairs as he reaches them. “Why? So you can make fun of me for it forever?”

Keith pulls up short at the top of the staircase. Pure frustration laces his veins. He grips the bannister with a fist.

“ _Because_ , Lance, I’m fucking—,” he shouts, across the entire ballroom. “I’m in love with you, you dumbass!”

Lance freezes. Everything freezes. Stars stop burning, moons stop orbiting, the entire universe comes to a screeching halt. Down the stairs and halfway across the room, Lance turns slowly. His face wears the same expression as the time Keith had found him huddled and bleeding out in a corner of a Galra battleship: eyes widening slowly, mouth falling open, watching Keith like he’s the most majestic sunrise in the entire galaxy. Keith waits for him to say something, _anything_ , really, but it takes approximately six months for Lance to turn fully towards him, and another three years for Lance to finally try words.

“No,” is the only thing he pushes out at first, the single syllable raspy and half a question.

Keith’s face scrunches. “What do you mean, ‘No,’ you can’t just fucking tell me how to—”

“But you’re _Keith_!” Lance shouts.

“What?” Keith says, because he already knows that he is Keith, and he fails to see how that connects, but Lance elaborates.

“You know, you’re like this…this….” Lance makes a series of unintelligible gestures with his hands. “This wild creature, some untameable beast or some shit. Feelings don’t interest you! All you ever wanna do is beat things up and then blow off steam!”

“You’re fucking kidding me,” Keith says. “Really?”

“ _Yes_ , really!”

“When did I say any of that?” Keith snaps.

Lance taps his hand on his chin in an overdramatic parody of someone who actually thinks about things. “Oh, I don’t know, maybe the third time we slept together when I asked you if you wanted to grab dinner first, just the two of us, and you literally said, ‘No, I just wanna blow off some steam’?”

“I didn’t—”

“Or when I asked you to stay the night and you shrugged me off and said it’d be better if you went to your own bed!”

“That was—”

“Or the time I told you that I liked you and you _laughed in my face_!”

“What?” Keith feels a little bit like he’s falling down the stairs, infinitely, but he’s still somehow standing at the top of them. “When was that?”

“Three months ago!” Lance says. He wipes violently at his eyes. “You don’t remember?”

Keith shakes his head, not just because he doesn’t remember, but also because there’s no way that could’ve happened. First of all, there’s no way that Lance, the Lance who flirts with anything vaguely female-shaped at every opportunity and the Lance who didn’t even kiss him until they were just about orgasming together and the Lance who told Keith that he didn’t want to sleep with him anymore, _likes_ him. And second, because Keith never would have laughed at that. Never.

But Lance is gaping at him like Keith has just cursed his mother, which makes Keith think that maybe, _maybe_ , Lance did tell him that at some point.

“We were on the bridge? Trying to figure out where we were going? And you said something dumb and I told you that I liked you!”

Keith’s mouth drops open. “You were saying that to me?”

Lance throws his hands in the air. “There was no one else there! Who could I have been talking to?”

“I don’t know! The ship? Space?” Keith feels like he’s withering. “I thought you were cracking a joke so I laughed because it was so dumb!”

Lance stares at him with his arms crossed and one eyebrow raised, until his shoulders drop and he sighs.

“Oh,” Keith says, and breathing hurts.

“You’ve been dragging me around this whole time, messing with my feelings, when I thought you _knew_ that I was entirely in love with you,” Lance says, his voice suddenly quiet. It carries through the large and empty room though, carries straight into Keith’s chest, where it tears open wounds. “And now you’re trying to tell me that you’re in love with me?”

Keith sighs and shrugs, weary. So weary. “Well, I am. Take it or leave it.”

 _Please take it_ , his brain says, but he could never say that to Lance out loud, that would be absolutely—

“Please take it,” he finds himself saying.

Lance stares at him for a long, long time. And then, he finally says, “Ugh.”

And follows it with a, “Come here.”

Keith nearly falls down the stairs, going three at a time, and stumbles the last three steps before barreling into the arms Lance is holding out for him.

* * *

 

Lance laughs uncontrollably into his shoulder, and then wipes his eyes there.

* * *

 

“You’re not creeped out by the whole me getting off to your jacket thing?” Lance asks into Keith’s shirt.

“Uh, yeah, that was weird,” Keith says, and then inhales deeply, because he’s never been able to just be still and enjoy the scent of Lance’s hair like this before. “But also strangely a turn on.”

Lance grabs him by the shoulders and pushes them apart just enough to look into each other’s eyes. “Perfect.”

* * *

 

Lance pulls Keith by the hand down towards their rooms, making jokes, grinning so widely Keith thinks his face might crack in two. When they get there they stumble into Keith’s bedroom, catch each other in their arms. They’re both laughing into each other, falling onto the bed. But when they pull apart in order to get rid of their clothes, they make the mistake of looking at each other, and suddenly they’re both trembling. Keith watches the blush spread over Lance’s face and he can feel the warmth in his own cheeks. He averts his eyes, his fists still balled in the fabric of Lance’s shirt.

That’s dumb. It’s not like this is the first or the second or even the fifteenth time they’ve done this. He pulls at Lance’s shirt, but he pulls too hard, and his motions are stiff, and his fingers are shaking. Lance doesn’t move to help him at all.

Instead he throws his hands over his face.

“Um,” Keith says, and stops awkwardly trying to rip Lance’s shirt off his body because it’s not going to happen with Lance’s arms like that. “Are you okay?”

“I’m great. Awesome. Perfect, as usual,” Lance says, but his voice, muffled by his hands, cracks somewhere in there. “Just, y’know, kinda…kinda a little nervous.”

Keith says, “You’re an idiot,” but his heart is pounding and he can’t look at Lance either.

“ _You’re_ an idiot,” Lance replies reflexively and drags his hands down his face. One glance at him and Keith wishes that Lance would hide behind his hands again. At least then he wouldn’t have to see those eyes that make his stomach swoop. “It’s just…it’s the first time we get to do it like this! Doesn’t that mean something?”

If Keith thinks about it logically, nothing has changed. He’s always had these feelings for Lance and Lance has always had these feelings for him. They’ve always tried to show each other in the only way they thought they were able to. There shouldn’t be anything different about just being aware of the other person’s feelings, especially since they both felt that way all along.

But there is.

“Yes,” Keith says, quietly.

And then he takes a deep breath, and slides his hands up under Lance’s shirt. Lance raises his eyes and looks at him a little bit like he’s seeing in color for the first time. After a moment he leans forward and noses his way into Keith’s personal space, resting their foreheads together. Keith freezes, caught off-guard, and feels his breath catch.

“I’m, um,” Lance says, “I’m gonna kiss you now.”

Keith swallows audibly. “Do it.”

Neither of them budges.

“Okay,” says Keith, and presses in, because he can’t wait any longer.

In all honesty, it’s the single most virginal experience he’s ever had, and that includes the time when he was, you know, a virgin. Kissing Lance like this, with gentle hands nervous to wander too far, is incredibly different from the rough and rushed experiences he’s used to. Part of him is impatient to just _get to it_ , be at the part where he can feel Lance all around him, inside him, biting and scratching, tussling and tumbling, hands and mouths all over. But there’s a new thing sprouting, an idea worming its way into his mind, asking him to control his motions, slow his pace.

So when he slips his tongue into Lance’s mouth it’s not with the driving power he usually gives it. When he skims his hands over Lance’s skin under his shirt he lets his fingertips dwell on every inch. When he gets closer it’s a drag and not a yank, and when he feels Lance’s hands loop around the back of his neck he basks in the feeling of them instead of encouraging them someplace else.

Lance comes away with unfocused eyes and parted swollen lips, and sways back a little. He looks Keith up and down, and then smiles, and then pouts.

“Fuck.”

“What’s wrong,” Keith says, and realizes his hand is flat on the bed already in response, like he’s prepared to use it to push off of and flee. Just in case.

Lance rises to his knees, pulling in closer with his hands still around Keith’s neck.

“You’re the worst.” He sighs, sinks his forehead to Keith’s shoulder, and stays there, breathing against his collarbone. “I’m never going to beat you, am I.”

Keith is helpless. He feels himself fall to jagged pieces right there, as Lance raises his head to press his lips against the side of his jawbone, tracing the ridge up to his earlobe and nibbling. Paralyzed, he lets this happen without reciprocation, until he makes his vocal chords work again.

“ _Dumbass_ ,” he says, and tosses Lance back without a second thought. Lance bounces against the mattress and stares up at Keith with wide eyes as Keith crawls over him. Keith stops where he can dip down and taste Lance’s throat. “You already fucking have.”

Lance moans like Keith is already tonguing at his cock, which makes Keith really want to do just that, but he’s still enjoying this very novel “going slow” thing. So instead he sucks Lance’s skin between his teeth until he knows that there’s blood blooming beneath it, and then moves up half an inch and does it again, and again, and again.

But now Keith’s getting heated, and he’s got Lance practically mewling below him already, and he can’t take his time much longer. He backs away and tugs again at the hem of Lance’s shirt, rolling it up towards his shoulders. Lance honestly seems too preoccupied with rubbing his thumbs along Keith’s hipbones to notice that Keith is trying to get his shirt over his head and off his arms.

“Do you wanna do this or not,” Keith asks, yanking impatiently at the fabric.

“Hey, I’m just trying to enjoy the moment,” Lance says, but throws his arms out so Keith can drag his shirt off him. The motion is honestly not sexy at all, more dramatic and demanding than anything else, but Keith finds himself so powerlessly desperate to kiss Lance anyway. As soon as his shirt is clear of his body, Keith swoops in for his lips again.

This time it’s Lance grappling with Keith’s clothes, and they break apart so Lance can pull his shirt off. Keith moves in, ready to feel his skin so wholly on him for the first time that he can savor it, but Lance’s hands keep him up so that he can work on his belt. Keith lets him fumble for a moment, also going for Lance’s fly, when Lance’s hands slow and then finally stop.

“What?” Keith asks, looking down at Lance again, who’s not meeting his eyes.

“Nothing, I just—.” Lance’s gaze darts to the side.

Keith snorts, but he’s feeling it too. How much thicker the air is between them this time. It’s not bad. In fact, it feels so good that he just wants to let it pervade him completely. But it’s different.

“Lance, I’ve had your dick _inside me_ ,” Keith tells him. “Seeing it right now isn’t going to make me stop liking you.”

“ _You’re_ a dick,” Lance says weakly in reply, like it’s somehow relevant to their conversation, and pulls off Keith’s belt. His pants. His socks. His boxers.

And then they’re both completely naked, Keith sitting up between Lance’s knees, Lance leaning back on his elbows. Keith is not the kind of person who likes taking pictures, or even really looking at them much, but he thinks if there is one image worth saving it’s this one. Lance looking up at him, face darkened with a blush, slender body bare to him, skin smooth and glowing.

“ _Shit_ ,” Keith breathes, and Lance flushes even deeper.

And then Lance sits up, grabs him by the waist, flips him around, hovers over him. Keith lets himself be pushed back onto the mattress, but are they seriously going to do this in goddamn missionary position because—oh. Lance’s fingers are gentle where they push, and now Lance’s tongue is in his mouth, and Keith completely forgets anything about everything except for Lance being here with him right now. His hair between Keith’s fingers, the ridges of his spine sliding beneath Keith’s open palm where it rests against Lance’s back.

Later, when Lance pushes inside, he and Keith don’t break eye contact. Keith thinks it’s going to be weird, embarrassing, but Lance’s eyes are so concerned as they watch Keith’s face for discomfort. He’s _always_ been looking at him like this, though, Keith realizes suddenly. Keith’s just been too blinded by his own wanting to notice. Lance is slow, takes his time, and when he bottoms out they both stop moving and listen to each other breathe for a long moment. They’re not even _doing_ anything and it feels good, it feels _so_ good, not like a rising tension and its promise of release, but a steady warmth in his chest.

So of course he wraps his arms around Lance’s shoulders and pushes his hips, encouraging Lance to move.

Lance does move. _Oh_ , does he move.

It’s slow, almost painful, the way Lance drags back, and then snaps forward again. Something he sees in Keith’s face must make him happy because he grins here, between the first and second thrusts, enough so that Keith has to tighten his grip around Lance’s shoulders. He thinks if he doesn’t the headiness will overtake him.

But he wants to touch more, so he does, running his fingertips across everything he can reach as Lance gradually picks up the pace. They’re both breathing hard already, and Keith’s heart stutters when Lance reaches up to brush hair out of his eyes.

Lance knows what he’s doing when it comes to Keith. Keith had spent a lot of this time thinking that Lance is just naturally good at this, but now looking at him he’s starting to realize how fully attuned Lance is to him. When Keith’s eyebrows furrow, Lance readjusts to make him comfortable. When Keith’s hips jolt, Lance eases off a little bit, saves him from overdoing it. When Keith tightens his grip on Lance and moans, Lance makes sure to repeat the same motion, again and again and again. Lance knows all the places Keith likes to be touched, all the things that drive him wild.

Keith can read him too. He knows when Lance is getting close, as his movements become less controlled, more sporadic. He murmurs Keith’s name into his collarbone between shallow breaths. Keith drags him up to his face, brings him in for a messy kiss that leaves him feeling wrecked and windswept.

It honestly doesn’t compare. It’s not even in the same range of perception. The way Keith feels when his entire body jolts, what it’s like this time with Lance’s hand curled around him and Lance’s eyes on his face, drinking him in. If the dozens of other times he’s done this with Lance have been great, this is shattering. Keith thinks he says Lance’s name when he comes, but he’s not sure, because his entire knowledge of the universe has shrunk down to just his awareness of warmth and Lance and how good it feels.

Lance isn’t far behind. Keith feels the heat of it inside of him and breathes deep, reveling in it.

Until Lance pulls out, and collapses entirely onto Keith.

“Oof, hey,” Keith scolds, but his voice is weak and Lance is boneless and warm on top of him. They’re both sweaty and sticky with cum but Keith can’t even bring himself to care, slipping his fingers into Lance’s hair.

* * *

 

“ _Quiznak_ ,” Lance says, throwing his arms over his face.

“What now,” Keith asks. He doesn’t know where Lance gets the energy for his dramatics from. Keith can barely gather the power to trace circles across Lance’s abdomen.

“You’re telling me,” Lance says, “that we could’ve been fucking like this the whole time? And cuddling the whole time? And doing all this stuff together, _the whole time_?”

“Stop complaining and go to sleep,” Keith says, all fondness and glowing warmth.

* * *

 

When Keith wakes up it’s to a sting on his neck. Without opening his eyes he moves his hand to swat at whatever its source is, and instead finds his arm’s path blocked by a very solid warm mass.

“Did I wake you up? Sorry,” says a voice that doesn’t sound very sorry at all, and immediately goes back to sucking marks into Keith’s skin.

Keith groans and rolls Lance off him. Or at least that’s what he meant to do. Instead he finds himself wrapping his arms tight around his waist and thinking that he’s probably not going to be able to take off his jacket around the others for the next few days if his neck is mottled in black and blue.

And you know what? He’s more than fine with that.

He also tries to rouse himself enough to look at Lance. Lance, who, for the first time ever, is really, actually _here_. In his bed. When he opens his eyes the first thing he sees is tufts of brown hair, defying gravity in the directions they’ve decided to take after a night against the pillow. His tan body is completely bare and stretched out over Keith, bony and smooth and beautiful.

“Ready?” Lance asks, picking his head up to look at Keith.

“For what?” Keith asks, a little breathlessly.

“For me to make sweet, sweet love to you again,” Lance says.

“Not after you’ve called it that,” Keith replies. “Don’t we have to get up for drills or something?”

“We still have a little time,” Lance breathes into his ear.

And Keith indulges him, because he’s had early morning sex with Lance before, but he’s never had we-just-shared-a-pillow-for-the-whole-night sex with Lance before, and it turns out they’re two incredibly different things. He likes this version a lot more, for one.

* * *

 

They sit next to each other at breakfast. A little too close, but Hunk only raises his eyebrows at them before shoveling spoonfuls of goo into his mouth. The talk is easy, casual, normal. Lance, as always, is nowhere near as funny as he thinks he is (except maybe to some part of Keith that he honestly will never not be in denial about). Keith lets the banter flow.

It isn’t until they’re both done with their food goo, easily debating the name of the color of the lights on their suits (“No way, it’s like a…bright teal or something.” “Bright teal? Go back to kindergarten and learn your colors, it’s called _aquamarine_.”), and Hunk is having a casual conversation with Allura and Coran about something decidedly less inane, that Keith feels something warm against his pinky.

It’s Lance’s hand.

The reaction is strange. It’s something like being at the dangerous end of a Galra’s laser guns or flying through an asteroid field, all thunderous heartbeats and nerves tingling…but like, _good_. And warm, _quiznak_ is he warm, right under the surface of his skin, prickling like electric shocks. Lance’s hand just stays there for a moment, against his, barely brushing his fingers, soft and inviting.

Keith snatches it quickly before he can think twice about it, curling his fingers in the spaces between Lance’s. Lance’s palm is _already_ clammy—how did he manage _that_ —but it feels pretty blissful against his own. Their conversation falls silent, and they both look pointedly in opposite directions, but Lance’s hand gives a squeeze and Keith gives a squeeze back and

Oh. They’ve made it.

Keith rests his free elbow on the table and puts his chin in his hand and hides his little smile behind his palm. He hates this. He hates feelings. But this…this isn’t really…that bad.

“Oh, _finally_ ,” Pidge says, sitting down at the table with a heaping bowl of food goo.

“What?” Keith and Lance ask at the same time, because it’s readily obvious that this comment is directed towards them.

She jerks her head towards their clasped hands. “Looks like you two got over your emotional constipation. I was a little worried when you stopped hooking up but—,” she shrugs, “looks like it’s working out better than ever.”

“You _knew_?” Keith says.

“Dude, there are only like, seven of us living on this ship,” Hunk says, “and we have freaky bondings where we look into each other’s minds. _Everyone_ knew.”

Keith and Lance share a glance, and Keith immediately realizes the mistake in this because his entire face jumps about three hundred degrees. He looks down towards the table, and there’s a moment in which he’s sure Lance is going to pull his hand away, in which he’s sure _he’s_ going to pull _his own_ hand away, but then they both simultaneously tighten their grasps. And Keith could not feel more contradictorily nervous and at ease.

“Oh my God,” Pidge says. “Oh my God, is this what it’s going to be like from now on? I’m gonna puke.”

“Come on,” Lance says. “We haven’t even _kissed_ in front of you yet.”

“Ugh, no thanks,” Pidge says. “Some of us are still eating.”

“Fine.” Lance stands suddenly, pulling Keith with him. Keith’s feet are barely under him when Lance begins to stride from the room. “We’ll go do it somewhere else.”

Keith could stop him. He could yank his hand back, or halt in his tracks. Keith is definitely stronger than Lance is, and there’s no reason for him to be going along with this. Other than that he _wants_ to.

He flashes a shy grin over his shoulder as he lets Lance pull him out of the dining room and into a small offshooting hallway. Lance pushes him back against the wall like he has a million times before. But this time there’s an evident tenderness, made even clearer when Lance doesn’t immediately reach for Keith’s dick or sink to his knees.

Instead he rests his forehead against Keith’s and smiles, big and sunny and delighted, at him. And in the next moment, Keith gets to taste that smile, and it’s so much more wonderful than he could’ve ever imagined.

**Author's Note:**

> can you tell that this was just an excuse to use the pining keith tag
> 
> EDIT: so the super super talented [Goopil](https://twitter.com/_Goopil) drew [a little pic](https://twitter.com/_Goopil/status/804362149992796160) of one of the scenes in this fic, please check it out! (heads up it's nsfw)


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